Klaus Sahlgren (Finland)

UNECE Executive Secretary from 1983 to 1986

Klaus Sahlgren received an advanced degree in economics from the Abo Academy, where he studied from 1946 to 1953. In 1955, he joined the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland. From 1957 to 1959 he was posted to the Federal Republic of Germany, following which he was posted to Egypt until 1962. After a two year assignment in the Foreign Ministry in Helsinki, he was transferred to the Finnish Embassy in China in 1964, where he remained until 1967. In 1968, he was appointed Assistant Under-Secretary in the Foreign Ministry, where he remained until he was sent as Permanent Representative of Finland to the United Nations in Geneva, a post that he held until 1975. He was also Chairman of the Council of the GATT for 1974-1975. From 1975 until his appointment as Executive Secretary of the UNECE in 1982, he served as Executive Director of the United Nations Centre on Transnational Corporations.